> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://beads.gascity.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# bd prune

> Delete old closed beads to reclaim space and shrink exports

Generated from `bd help --doc prune`.

Permanently delete closed non-ephemeral beads and their associated data.

Use this to trim closed regular beads (tasks, features, bugs, chores, etc.)
that are no longer useful. The common case is a long-lived repo where
closed work has piled up and is bloating auto-export or slowing queries.

Requires --older-than or --pattern. The flag is a safety gate — without
it, a muscle-memory `--force` could wipe every closed bead in the repo.
Use `--pattern '*'` if you really do want to sweep everything closed.

Deletes: issues, dependencies, labels, events, and comments for matching beads.
Skips: pinned beads (protected), open/in-progress beads, and ephemeral beads.

Also skips closed beads whose ID appears in the description, notes, or
comments of any open / in-progress bead. This protects ADR / decision /
verification trails that downstream beads still cite. Use
\--ignore-references to override (e.g., when bulk-decommissioning a
retired label across the rig).

To delete closed ephemeral beads (wisps, transient molecules) use
`bd purge` instead.

For full Dolt storage reclaim after deleting many rows, follow with `bd flatten`
so history can be collapsed and old chunks can be garbage-collected.

EXAMPLES:
bd prune --older-than 30d              # Preview closed beads >30d old
bd prune --older-than 30d --force      # Delete them
bd prune --older-than 90d --dry-run    # Detailed preview with stats
bd prune --pattern "*" --force         # Delete all closed regular beads
bd prune --pattern "gm-temp-*" --force # Scope to a pattern

```
bd prune [flags]
```

**Flags:**

```
      --dry-run             Preview what would be pruned with stats
  -f, --force               Actually prune (without this, shows preview)
      --ignore-references   Delete closed beads even when referenced by open beads (use with care; see --help for details)
      --older-than string   Only prune beads closed more than N ago (e.g., 30d, 2w, 60)
      --pattern string      Only prune beads matching ID glob pattern (e.g., 'gm-old-*')
```